Stanley wastewater operator Nick Martin and his helper Dean Schneider would like to save the city some money, but in order to get the council’s approval, there might need to be a slight adjustment to the numbers, with action put off for two week’s time to address potential future costs. Martin last appeared at a common council meeting on February 17 of this year, with more reed beds and a bigger digester on the table at that time. The February plans would cost the city checkbook almost $2.5 million, while Martin’s belt press proposal could shrink this figure to just $825,000, with $75,000 of that for engineering, if the current numbers can be reconciled with future speculation. Since Martin’s February appearance there had been an election and with it a changing of the council guard.

“Three of us didn’t get the email,” newly elected alderman Kevin Hendrickson told Martin of the belt press proposal September 8. “That’s why we’re a little cold to this.” Hendrickson had also done some research on other municipalities waste department practices, including those for Abbotsford and Eau Claire. Martin filled in the

council on his own waste proposal.

“So last Wednesday at the meeting we had, we talked about adding a new treatment process to the plant that would include a belt press,” he said. “which would allow us to press our sludge into a dried cake, and therefore have it hauled off site.” This would allow the city to save its remaining reed beds as well as replant reed bed four, reported to be “dead” by the City Wastewater Operator after being loaded with sludge before it could fully establish. Reed bed four would be replanted with American Bulrush or other native species favored by the DNR, he said. “They kind of frown on the Phragmites that we currently have,” Martin told the council. Martin also

Photo by Joseph Back.

Stanley Wastewater Operator Nick Martin (right) and his assistant Dean Schneider spoke at the September 8 council meeting on a system that would belt press city solids for disposal offsite.